Snowpiercer

I have been waiting for this movie for so long. Its been a long time since Bong Joon-ho's Host and Mother, two of the best Korean movies I've seen. Snowpiercer came out in South Korea last year and there was the bruhaha about Harvey Weinstein wanting to cut the movie by 20 minutes. Bong Joon-ho managed to keep its cut but the movie is now having a limited release (not in Australia) but its finally found its way to the interwebs.

Snowpiercer is a sci-fi, post apocalyptic tale about a world that has basically gone back into the ice ages and the only remaining humans are on this self-sustaining train that travels all over the world. People on the train are divided based on class with the poorest people at the back. Hellboy's dad is the leader of the people at the end of the train and Captain America is his right arms who leads the people at the back in revolt against Tilda Swinston's evil Minister Mason. Song Kang-ho (JSA/Mr. Vengeance/The Host) is in this movie as a drug addicted security expert and since its a sci-fi, he gets to speak Korean throughout.

Elysium turned out to be a skin deep analogy for class warfare but Snowpiercer thankfully turns out to be a thinking man's sci-fi which presents interesting ideas to the viewer but doesn't provide the viewer with easy answers. Let's just say its not a simple story of haves versus the have-nots.

Like Park Chan-Wook's Stoker, its nice to see my favourite Korean filmakers put their sensibilities in English language movies. Bong Joon-ho isn't afraid to get into some nice twisted humour with the classroom scene. The only complaint I have is that the movie doesn't explain some of the rooms in the middle of the train and I kept looking for where all the higher class people were staying. Snowpiercer didn't blow my mind but it stayed in my mind long after watching. Must watch.